Happylittlegreensquirrel Posted March 5, 2011 Report Share Posted March 5, 2011 As you'll have gathered from the long silence, things have been pretty busy in Sri Lanka over the past couple of months! Luckily, we had volunteer Paula with the team from November through to mid February which was a real bonus. But the patients kept coming...... Here are a couple of our key cases from January and February: Towards the end of January, an elderly gentleman who lives several kilometres from Dogstar house asked for help with a litter of 3 pups whose mum had sadly died. We took them in at 15 days old and the whole team then set to work - with the help of other MEF volunteers - feeding the pups 4 hourly. Sam was here at that time and she and Paula did a sterling job with the 2am and 6am feeds!! Christened 'The 3 Stooges' (Curly, Larry and Moe) by US volunteer Matt, the pups have thrived on masses of hard work from everyone (I did the early morning shift latterly and that meant a lot of cleaning up!). From around 400g on arrival, all 3 boys grew rapidly reaching up to 1.9kg (Moe) had their first ARV injections. Here are a couple of photos of the boys (Larry - black and white, Curly - dark brown, Moe - light brown) who we think are gorgeous! I'm very happy to report that all 3 of the boys have been taken to lovely new homes over the past few days so we'll be keeping a check on their progress and will post new photos when available. Moe - 7 February 2011 Curly, Larry and Moe - 7 February 2011 Brotherly love - 28 February 2011 Curly and Larry - 28 February 2011 Curly with his new family - 28 February 2011 This has been a lovely story for Dogstar - I don't think any of us really expected all 3 pups to survive as they had been without their mum for a couple of days when they came to us, but with a lot of hard work and a lot of affection from the Dogstar team and MEF volunteers they have thrived and given us so much fun and love in return! Also with us while we had the boys were 2 female pups - the first called Lucy who was found wandering at MEF. She stayed with us for around 10 days for some good feeding, routine worming and vaccinations before going off to a new home. Here she is with MEF volunteer Marie: The second was Poppet who was found dehydrated and infested with ticks at our local temple in Randeniya. Aravinda spotted her while we were doing a routine check of the other dogs there and she was coweing under a pile of coconuts. She was taken to DS house and put on a drip and the team led by Sam spent around 2 hours removing the ticks from her ears. Here she is below a couple of days after her initial treatment: Poppet proved to be made of strong stuff and quickly recovered, becoming one of the most energetic pups we've had the pleasure to care for (i.e. very hard work!). From under 1kg on arrival, after a month with us her weight went up to around 3.8kg! This is also a story with a great ending as our own driver Sampath and his lovely family decided to give Poppet a new home. Here she is having her bath before being taken to them: And here she is below with Sampath and his family (wife Nishani and son Samidu who is now great friends with Poppet - sharing his dinner and his bed with her!). Another patient who has been taking up a lot of our time is Kalugalla Temple dog Harvey. He's around 5 years old and until last autumn was extremely fit, healthy and very handsome. However, he started losing his fur and his weight dropped alarmingly towards the end of 2010. Even with advice from vets from both Sri Lanka and the UK, we've not been able to make too much progress - but despite his appearance, Harvey is still eating well and is very lively and alert. Last week Dr Manjula from TAPA reviewed him again and now suspects he has some form of pancreatic enzyme deficiency. Harvey- March 2010 Harvey - December 2010 Harvey's now on treatment and we're hoping to see an improvement in his condition. Mo and Aravinda will continue to visit Harvey twice daily to feed and give meds and we hope to be able to show some photos of him looking better soon. The final case for this blog is Tiger - a lovely male pup of around 4 months old who decided to take on a monkey - and lost! Tiger's ear was almost ripped off (the photo is quite graphic so be warned.....) but quick action by his owners and an expert stitching job by local vet Dr. Prashashini has left him looking almost as good as new...... Tiger pre-surgery Tiger 3 days (yes, THREE DAYS!) post-surgery I hope that gives you a flavour of the work that's been going on since we last met and we'll catch up again soon! Thank you all for your messages of support for Dogstar - they really mean a lot to the team here! Mo x x Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phoenix Posted March 6, 2011 Report Share Posted March 6, 2011 you do such sterling work, keep it up, poor tiger, hopefully he will back away from monkeys now, that ear was horrific, beautifly stiched though, your team are a credit to you Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Happylittlegreensquirrel Posted March 6, 2011 Author Report Share Posted March 6, 2011 Also have a small video with Tiger and his happy owner http://www.flickr.com/photos/dogstarteam/5501638783/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blackmagic Posted March 6, 2011 Report Share Posted March 6, 2011 What yo have achieved is amazing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
merledogs Posted March 7, 2011 Report Share Posted March 7, 2011 It's incredible what you guys do Love the pics and the updates, keep them coming (as and when Dogstar work permits of course). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kats n greys Posted March 7, 2011 Report Share Posted March 7, 2011 It's not only the dogs that you and Dogstar help- it must make you smile Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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